


Cleaning House

by andachippedcup



Series: Domestic Belle [5]
Category: Once Upon a Time (TV)
Genre: F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-02-04
Updated: 2013-02-04
Packaged: 2017-11-28 04:03:25
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,233
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/670061
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/andachippedcup/pseuds/andachippedcup





	Cleaning House

“Rum, you don’t  _need_  this vase. We’ve got a dozen more under the sink and this one’s hideous. We can donate it and the rest of these vases.” Belle insisted, one hand on her hip and the other dangling a  _heinous_  looking black and olive green vase with lemon yellow flowers painted on the sides.

“Oh no dearie, we need the whole lot. Donating them? That just won’t do.” He tutted, shaking his head resolutely.

 “Rum.” She warned, her brows slanting downward into her ‘don’t fight me on this’ face.

“Belle?” He intoned back in mock curiosity, as if there was a question behind her name. There wasn’t. He knew he was misbehaving and the little imp gloried in it.

“ _Rumplestiltskin_  you listen here. This house ought to be condemned. You’ve got trinkets crammed in every nook and cranny and most of these things haven’t seen the light of day in years. You don’t use or need three quarters of this junk. We’re getting rid of it one way or the other, mark my words.” She finished, brandishing the vase in question at him menacingly.

He could only chuckle and shake his head. Oh Belle. Sweet, precious, innocent little Belle. _She’ll learn eventually_ , he thought to himself.

“You can try, dearie, but you’re never going to get me to part with my baubles.” He giggled, residual Dark One shining through in that obnoxious little laugh. Belle frowned at him, slammed the vase back down into place and stormed off.

It was time for a change of tactic.

——-

When he came home the next day, he heard the television droning from the living room.  _Odd._  Belle wasn’t not much a fan of television, and of the few programs she did enjoy, daytime television was not currently amongst them.

He walked into the room and found her there,  _lounging_  on the couch, not even paying any mind to the show that was on.

“Belle dearie?” He questioned, only for Belle to point forcefully at the television, her message clear.  _Watch this_.

He directed his attention to the screen, frowning as he watched people tromping about in piles of filth. There were mountains of magazines and stacks of boxes and trash and random objects all over the screen. Only the smallest path was kept clear for the people to navigate through it all, and that was when he saw the title of the program in the little watermark at the bottom of the screen.

“Hoarders? Really, little lamb, I’m far from a  _hoarder_.” He intoned with a chuckle.

She didn’t say a word, simply frowned at him and departed from the room.

She’d have to change tactics again.

——-

The next day, when he came home, the house was  _unrecognizable_. There were boxes stacked to the ceiling and various items strewn about on top of them as if a tornado had ripped the fucking house apart. And it wasn’t just the entryway – the living room was equally wrecked and the kitchen, though to a much lesser extent, was also a mess. He found the guest bedroom in shambles too.

“Belle?!” He yelled from the bottom of the stairs. Her face appeared at the top of the staircase, a beaming smile on her features.

“Welcome home, darling!” She grinned wickedly, leaning on the railing with bright eyes and a barely suppressed smile.

“What,” he paused, motioning to the chaos, “is all of this? It looks like something out of your little hoarder show, dearie.”

Belle’s grin split open her face and she snorted out a little laugh before she deigned to answer him.

“Why darling, don’t you recognize your collection? These boxes are everything from the storage units in town and everything from the garage and the shed in the backyard and everything from the attic.” She paused for a moment, the light in her eyes positively _wicked_  now. “But you’re right, it  _does_  look like my ‘little hoarder show’, doesn’t it?”

He stopped and his posture deflated ever so slightly as he realized just how much that little slip of the tongue was going to cost him.

 _Damn it_.

He ought to know better by now. Belle’s an angel, yes. But she’s only a part time angel. The other part of the time, she’s a treacherous little minx and right now it would seem she’s embracing that more devilish side of herself in an attempt to clean house.

——-

He absolutely  _detested_  everything about this garage sale business. But Belle had insisted and as always, he’d caved. He was quite convinced that Belle had magic all her own. It was the only explanation for how she won every argument without fail. Certainly it wasn’t simply that he loved her and couldn’t resist giving in. No, not at all. He’d never be that weak. No. Belle had magic, that was the obvious answer.

Still, as he stood, leaning heavily against the side of the house, watching as the town’s inhabitants swooped about like lazy vultures to examine his things, he was feeling somewhat possessive of the objects he was supposed to be parting ways with.

“Excuse me, Mr. Gold? How much for this vase?” David Nolan had asked, holding in his hands the exact vase that Belle had proclaimed to be positively heinous.

“It’s not for sale!” He snapped and snatched the item away from David with a harsh frown as he stamped back toward the inside of the house, intent on stuffing the vase somewhere for safekeeping. Dragons were not prone to sharing or whittling down of their hoards and this whole garage sale business felt positively  _apocalyptic_.

However, before he could safely abscond with his treasure, a feather light pair of hands pried the vase from his grasp and, brown curls bouncing, Belle darted back to David and extended the vase toward him.

“It’s five dollars! All these vases are five apiece. And they’re three for twelve dollars, if you’re interested.” Belle beamed. David grinned and eagerly scooped up another pair of vases while he muttered something about surprising Mary Margaret with them.

Belle smiled and accepted the money quietly before bouncing back to the antique cash register she’d been using for transactions, pressing a peck to his cheek as she passed.

“Don’t look so sad.” She scolded.

“I’m not sad!” He replied defiantly, to which Belle could only giggle.

“You look as though someone’s kicked your puppy.” She pointed out to him smilingly, offering him another kiss, this one a little bit longer and on the lips.

“Believe me dearie, I wouldn’t be bothered in the slightest by the kicking of a puppy. But the giving away of precious treasures? Yes, I do have something to say about that.” He grumbled under his breath. Belle, however, refused to be taken in by his black mood. She sidled up to him and buried herself against him, rising on her tippy toes to whisper in his ear.

“And is this  _you_  complaining, or is this  _Rumplestiltskin_  and  _the Dark One_  grumbling, hmm?” She chuckled, her voice low and boasting a certain husky quality that made him want to whisk her away back into the house.

“ _Rumplestiltskin and the Dark One_.” He grumbled, knowing damn well that even the plain old Mr. Gold in him detested this every bit as much.

“That’s what I thought.” She beamed as she leaned into him even more and wrapped her arms around his neck. In one swift motion, she went up onto the tips of her toes to press a kiss to his nose, her eyes all asparkle as she kissed the little dimple between his nose and his lips and then, blessedly, she kissed him on the lips, long and perhaps a touch more passionately than was appropriate with half the town sifting through their personal belongings. But kiss him she did, to the point that there was the slightest hint of heat in his cheeks and his mind went from a crammed chalkboard to a clean slate.

Then, quick as a wink, she was gone, a bright smile tossed his way as she went to mingle with their potential customers. Half angel, yes, but darting away like that? That was the devil in her, little rogue of a girl that she was.

—————

Over the course of the next two and a half hours, he was forced to grin and bear it as Archie made off with a stack of dusty psychology volumes and Ruby made out like a bandit with nearly his entire collection of vinyl records. Hard losses all, but nothing like the crippling blow dealt him by the savior.

The damn girl had only been browsing half heartedly, here, he suspected, only as a show of support for Belle. As such, he had not bothered to lurk close by to her, figuring she would not buy anything or, at most, a single, simple trinket to help Belle feel as if her sale had been a success.

So instead, he’d been busy circling around as the  _fucking blue fairy_  (or “Mother Superior”, he should say) rifled through the table of figurines (mostly tiny fairies and angels, ironically enough). And he’d been so distracted by her, he’d been so  _certain_  that _the fucking fairy_  was the true threat, that he’d neglected to watch the savior.

Naturally, she’d then found his collection of antique car and truck toys. He hadn’t seen Belle put the box out or he’d have whisked them back inside faster than you could “dearie”. But as it was, the damn little fairy left without buying a damn thing (just to spite him, he’d guess) and in the time he’d spent watching her, Emma had found the toys and bought the lot of them.

When he’d seen Belle ring up the transaction, he’d made a beeline for the pair of women and thrown a fit. Belle had actually been forced to pry him off of the box and even once she’d accomplished that much, she’d then had to grapple with him to get the crook of his cane off of Emma’s arm so the unsuspecting shopper could flee with her purchases.

 _And he was the coward_?

He’d gotten off with a  _very_  stern warning from Belle for that one and she’d tried to console him by telling him the toys were destined to go to Henry, as Emma had thought he might like them. And though he’d previously never had a problem with the savior’s son, suddenly he was regretting bringing the little twerp to Storybrooke. If he hadn’t, he might still have his trucks about now.

So he’d switched between lurking and pouting, with a great deal more pouting than lurking until Ashley and Sean had shown up, their little brat pushed between them in a stroller. The infant had stolen his attention (she having been the bargaining chip in their deal, after all) but apparently he was not alone in that regard. When he’d looked up from the child to check on Belle amongst the crowd, he’d found his wife’s eyes were similarly trained upon the child with a look that he was only all too familiar with.

He wasn’t able to dwell on it though, as Ashley had quickly picked up a small box of glass ornaments and a few pairs of shoes (women’s and not Belle’s size, but still something that might be terribly necessary down the road and therefore, not to be sold). At that point, he’d forgotten about his wife’s looks of longing and instead focused on waging war with Cinderella and her damn Prince. Those two always had managed to get under his skin and fuck things up and he would not let them do so again now, with his treasure trove of trinkets on the line.

However, he soon learned that going into people’s strollers and removing items from said stroller after those items were purchased was somehow frowned upon. Apparently that was ‘underhanded’ and ‘juvenile’ and ‘petty’ and it was not to be repeated, if Belle was to be trusted. Which usually, she was but…well, Belle was selling to anyone who cared to buy and really, she had no idea what kind of dark motives Cinderella probably had for buying those shoes and ornaments. Nefarious things, no doubt. And he was expected to sit idly by?

Belle had punished him for that one by forcibly dragging him back into the house, her face contorted into her best ‘stern and scolding’ face as she pushed him onto the couch.

“You’ve lost your lurking privileges.” She announced fiercely as her hands went to her hips in a delightfully serious manner.

“Privileges? Dearie, it’s my house and they’re my things, I’ll watch if I wa-” He was interrupted by a hand clasped about his mouth, stifling his words mid-sentence.

“No.” Belle hushed him quickly. “Lurking and badgering my customers is a privilege and you just lost yours. You’re to sit here and wait for me until the sale’s over. Am I understood?” She withdrew her hand to allow him to speak, her brows raised expectantly.

“Belle, dearie-” he attempted to talk his way out of trouble, only to have her return her hand to his mouth.

“No Rum. I don’t want excuses. Just yes or no – do you understand what I just told you?” She queried, once more removing her hand. He glowered at her for a moment (but really, it was a halfhearted glower; he couldn’t be mad at her if he tried) and then he finally acquiesced.

“Very well. But don’t expect me to help with clean up then; I’d hate to be too lurk-y around the fold up tables and chairs.” He retorted sarcastically, smirking at the sharp frown of reproof he received for his efforts. Belle sighed and shook her head, then swept out of the house and back outside without another word.

————-

He watched the ongoings from the window, naturally. He probably vaguely resembled a dog accustomed to being at its owner’s side, suddenly forced to watch its owner from afar, what with the way his face was pressed up against the glass, his breath fogging it and nose leaving little smudge marks. She’d kill him for that later, she’d only just cleaned, but really? Confining him to the house? That was just uncalled for. So he had to sit and watch her through the window, his eyes trained intently upon her.

She flitted about from table to table, exchanging money with customers when necessary and chatting with them when it wasn’t. Again, he was reminded of how magnificent she was, how kind, how  _exceptionally out of his league_  she was.

So when the sale ended close to lunch time, it was no surprise that he couldn’t resist going back to her and helping to clean up, despite his earlier threats to the contrary. When all was cleaned up and put back in the (considerably emptier) garage, they collapsed together on the couch, Belle curled up into his side.

“Well, how did you do, selling off my horde, hmm little lamb?” He asked teasingly as he stroked the top of her head, able to feel her exhaustion even from here. She wriggled against his side, burrowing as close to him as she could possibly get before she responded.

“Quite well, actually. Surprisingly enough, there are other people in this town that like some of the same, odd things that you do.” She grinned up at him and kissed the side of his jaw gently and intended to leave it at that. But he had been  _good_  and  _obedient_  and he had stayed in the house and now he deserved his just reward.

 “I’m sure they do; as I’ve told you many times dearie, I have an eye for lovely things.” He remarked pointedly, slipping his hand below her chin to hold her face in place close to his. Then, very slowly, he leaned in, letting his lips just barely brush hers before he kissed her top lip, soft and slow and drawn out, teasing her as payback for his own morning of torture.

She squirmed beside him and tried to deepen the kiss but he resisted and pulled away from her to give her a wicked grin.

“You’re a poor loser, Rumplestiltskin.” She pouted for a moment, though he could hear the smile in her voice.

“Oh, I’d hardly say I’m a loser here today, dearie. After all, we do have our spoils to spend on all kinds of delightful things now, don’t we?” He whispered into her ear with a smirk before he placed a kiss to it. Rumplestiltskin had a few choice ideas for how they could spend her hard earned dollars and he was more than happy to share them with her. First though, he sought out her lips and Belle, weak to resist him, moved into him for a more intimate kiss than before. When they finally broke away, however, she was laughing softly, a fact that had him more than a mite self conscious of his skills.

 “What on earth is so funny, love?” He queried brusquely.

Belle bit her lip and rolled it between her teeth for a moment before she licked her lips and gave him a sheepish grin.

“Well it’s just….our earnings? They’re not being spent on any ‘goodies’, Rum.” She batted her eyes innocently at him as his chest deflated and his lips settled into a childish pout.

“And what  _are_  we spending the money on, if not on  _goodies_?” He asked, to which he received a wide grin and a deep, mind numbing kiss. When she finally broke away from him, his brain was a haze and he barely had the presence to register her words.

“When I was fishing some of your things out of the attic, I found rats. Loads of them, Rum. They’ve taken over the attic. I called the pest control company; we’ve got our very own Pied Piper coming tomorrow, but we’ll have to stay at the bed and breakfast while they deal with the infestation. And it will actually cost all of what we made today, plus… a little extra.” She beamed and gave him a loving pat on the shoulder before she leaped up off the couch and skipped down the hall.

“R-rats?” He stammered in a daze as she pranced down the hallway, leaving him to blink in confusion with the sensation of having been hit by a semi-truck’s worth of information.

“Mmhmm. You should really pack, we’re leaving bright and early tomorrow!” She called out from the other room.

So he’d behaved (well….sort of) and he was not only  _not_  getting a reward, but he was going to have to pay to stay in that old she wolf’s bed and breakfast, where he most decidedly could  _not_  run amok as he pleased with his wife.

Well. That was certainly _no_  incentive for him to behave now. He’d have to be on his best behavior at the bed and breakfast, so he’d have to cram all his impish behavior into what remained of today.

With a wolfish grin, he chased after Belle down the hallway, intent on being compensated for not turning the lot of their customers into snails. That had taken self control; he deserved  _something_  for that kind of restraint. And he had the perfect idea of how she could reward him for that…


End file.
